Understanding Intercultural
Communication Second Edition
Chapter 8
What Causes us to Hold Biases Against
Outgroups?
Stella Ting-Toomey & Leeva C. Chung
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
PowerPoint Slides Designed by Alex Flecky and Noorie Baig
TODAY’S MENU
I.
Human Perception Tendencies: Some
General Principles
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
III. Marking Ingroup/Outgroup
Membership Boundaries
IV. Shattered Lens: Prejudice,
Discrimination, and Racism
V. Intercultural Reality Check: Do-Ables
I. Human Perception Tendencies: Some
General Principles
Human perception:
• Process of selecting cues quickly from the
environment, organizing them into a coherent
pattern and labeling that pattern, and
interpreting that pattern in accordance with
our expectation.
Quick three-step process:
• Selective attention
• Selective organization and labeling
• Selective interpretation.
Perception Test
YouTube Perception Test
How many times does the team wearing
white pass the basketball?
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
A. Ethnocentrism and Communication
Ethnocentrism: derived from two Greek
words:
Ethno: “one’s own ethnic or cultural group”
Centrism: “One’s own group should be
looked upon as the center of the world”
Degrees of ethnocentrism:
• Distance of disparagement (high ethnocentrism)
• Distance of avoidance (moderate ethnocentrism)
• Distance of indifference (low ethnocentrism)
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
Developmental Model of Intercultural
Sensitivity (DMIS)
Developed by Janet Bennett & Milton Bennett
A Popular Intercultural Training Model:
• Three states of ethnocentrism
• Three states in development of ethnorelativism
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
Stereotype content model (SCM):
Formed along two dimensions:
• Perception of warmth dimension
• Perception of competence dimension
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
A Two-Dimensional Stereotype Content Model
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
Stereotyping is inevitable; key is to distinguish
between inflexible and flexible stereotyping.
• Inflexible stereotyping: holds onto negative
stereotypes by operating on automatic pilot.
• Flexible stereotyping: “mindfully minding our
mind.”
II. Biased Intergroup Filters:
Ethnocentrism and Stereotypes
Table 8.1
Inflexible Stereotyping
Flexible Stereotyping
Automatic pilot reaction
Mindful of categorization
Rigid categories
Open-ended categories
Premature closure
First best-guesses
Polarized evaluations
Loose interpretations
Information distortion
Information openness
Unwilling to change
categories
Willingness to change
categories
II. Biased Intergroup Filters: Ethnocentrism
and Stereotypes
Click here to view UCLA student Alexandra Wallace’s
rant on Asian students in the library
• What are your interpretations?
• Apology accepted? Forgive & forget? Forgive but not
forget?
Click here to view Jimmy Wong’s reaction to
Alexandra Wallace
• What did you think of Wong’s response to Alex?
II. Biased Intergroup Filters: Ethnocentrism
and Stereotypes
B. Stereotypes and Communication
Stereotypes:
• Exaggerated pictures about a group of people on
the basis of inflexible beliefs and expectations
about the characteristics or behaviors of the group.
•
What are some factors that shape stereotypes?
Click here to view a clip from The Color of Friendship
III. Marking Ingroup-Outgroup
Membership Boundaries
Ingroup and Outgroup Attribution Differences
III. Marking Ingroup-Outgroup
Membership Boundaries
A. Us versus Them
Social identity theory:
Study of ingroup, outgroup membership,
how emotional attachment to social group
plays key role in forming social/personal
identity.
Ingroup: feel connected to.
Outgroup: feel emotionally and psychologically
detached.
III. Marking Ingroup/Outgroup
Membership Boundaries
B. Group Membership Struggle
C. Intergroup Attribution Biases
Attributions: the explanations—the meanings
of why people behave as they do.
• Fundamental attribution error
• Principle of negativity
• Favorable self-bias and other-derogation
principle
• Self-effacement bias
III. Marking Ingroup/Outgroup
Membership Boundaries
Media Analysis: Crash film clip
Reflection Questions:
•
•
•
Where did the wife acquire her fear and
biases?
Do you think stereotypes—both negative and
positive—have their place? How so?
Where do we learn our stereotypes?
IV. Shattered Lens: Prejudice,
Discrimination, and Racism
Prejudice:
Describes an individual’s feelings and
predispositions toward outgroup members in a
pejorative or negative direction, but can also
mean the opposite: One can be indiscriminately
for or against members of a particular group.
Four explanations for development of prejudice:
•
•
•
•
Exploitation theory
Scapegoating theory
Authoritarian personality approach
Structural approach
IV. Shattered Lens: Prejudice,
Discrimination, and Racism
B. Prejudiced Remarks . . .or Innocent Jokes?
Click here to watch a clip on how some ingroup members
treat their own members like outgroup members.
Where to draw the line question is difficult to
answer. . .
Click here to move toward the conscious competence
stage with respect to stereotyping, prejudice and
discrimination.
(*Caution – these clips contain offensive language).
IV. Shattered Lens: Prejudice,
Discrimination, and Racism
C. Four Discriminatory Practices
Discrimination:
Verbal and nonverbal actions that carry out
prejudiced attitudes. Four practices:
•
•
•
•
Isolate discrimination:
Small-group discrimination
Direct institutional discrimination
Indirect institutional discrimination
IV. Shattered Lens: Prejudice,
Discrimination, and Racism
D. Different Types of Racism
Racism involves three principles:
• Feelings of superiority based on biological or racial
differences;
• Strong ingroup preferences and the rejection of
outgroups, different in customs or beliefs; and
• Doctrine that conveys special advantage to those in
power.
Three basic examples of racism:
• Racial profiling
• Perpetuating stereotypic images
• Hate crimes
V. Intercultural Reality Check: Do-Ables
•
Be honest about your own biases.
•
Understand where you learn your stereotypes.
•
Seek accurate identity membership knowledge.
•
Get involved in diverse identity communities.
•
Cultivate constructive, intergroup contacts.
•
Work on positive, interdependent task goals.
•
Personalized the relationships & build trust.
•
Learn to listen and share…
Parting Thoughts…
In spite of everything I still believe that people are
really good at heart.
I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation
consisting of confusion, misery and death.
~ Anne Frank